The background to this project started in early 2018, when a group of Tadley scouts, as part of a scouting explorer belt challenge, walked the length of Belgium visiting sites of interest relevant to the first world war . A chance encounter involved them modelling a clay model for an art installation, “Coming World Remember Me” by artist Koen Vanmechelen.

Koen Vanmechelen in front of his art installation

The 600,000 clay sculptures represent the Belgian town of Ypres, where more than half a million people died during the First World War. The clay model’s backs are bent and they have an associated metal stamp bearing the name of a specific dead soldier.

600,000 sculptures in no-mans land

The scouts found that knowing the name of specific soldier associated with the clay model made the person real in a way that sheer numbers could not. They visited his grave and found out more about his life. As a result of this experience they decided it would be good to do the same thing on a smaller scale for the fallen of Tadley.

The sculpture to commemorate the dead of Tadley has one hexagonal column for each soldier. Thirty one individuals from the first world war and six individuals from the second world war. Information about the soldiers is now the subject of a book by Tadley and District History Society.

Original design in OpenScad

The memorial was created in Basingstoke makerspace over a period of two and a half weeks. The circular base was designed with Fusion-360 and cut out with the X-carve, The hexagon columns were cut out with the bench saw and the soldiers names and title plaque etched with the laser cutter.

Making Hexagonal columns

First trial pieces

Completed hexagonal stack

The memorial supported talks by the scouts and the vicar at the 2018 Remembrance Service at St Paul’s Church in Tadley. Relatives of lost soldiers were present at the service. A brief description of each soldier brought home what a huge impact the loss in 1918 of so many individuals made to a community of about 1500 people. Everybody would have known somebody who had died.

Remembering the dead during the service

When you look at the memorial the majority of the fallen were between 20 and 30. Some were as young as 18 and the two oldest being 39.

The final completed memorial.

Tadley town council has decided to permanently display the memorial. A glass case will be commissioned to contain it.

Earlier this year Shorey Designs invented fabric-based flexible scale-maille. They did this by 3D printing individual scales with a backing tulle fabric, embedded after half a dozen print layers.

We could not resist giving this a go at Basingstoke Makerspace. As you can see we produced a robust set of scales with the tulle backing firmly attached. Several applications come to mind: using the technique for Cosplay items, creating scale-backed gloves for bike riding or making an interesting necklace and ear-rings. We really like the idea of using it for really neat cat armour.

On the third Thursday of each month Basingstoke Makerspace members get together for “Pi Night”. This month that will be on 18th Oct at 7:00pm.

This is an open meeting for all members to pose and answer any Raspberry Pi related questions. Any Pi based topics can be brought up. There is normally a range of levels of experience available, from those who want to know how to get started to those connecting their Pi to electronics and manipulating the GPIO pins via C.

On Monday 15th October the photography interest group spent an evening photographing water drops.

David who took the above picture said: “On Monday Basingstoke Makerspace held a ‘photographing drops’ session. I think this is my favourite shot of the night from my camera.
It’s also given me an idea for a project I want to try.”

We used a Speed-light flash and a Pluto trigger together with a triggered drop release mechanism to produce reproducible drops.

After a falling water drop splashes into a bowl of water a crown is forme from displaced water. the bulk of the drop remains intact and enters the water. In the following picture the crown can be seen with a second drop timed to fall artistically just above the crown.

As the initial drop enters the water in the centre of the crown it displaces water in the bowl upwards. This slows the drop’s downward speed until it stops. At this point it starts to moves up pushed by the displaced water. When it reaches the surface it breaks out of the surface with surface tension forming a stalk with some fraction of the original drip on the top. The remains of the crown can be seen spreading out.

We then added a second drip to collide with the upward rising stalk from a previous drop. When the two collide

Makerspace Members get full 24/7 access to the Makerspace and its studio.

Residents came to Basingstoke Makerspace from across the borough to have their broken items looked at and hopefully repaired, so that they did not have to throw out the broken items.

On hand at the Repair Café was a wealth of local expertise from the volunteers at the Makerspace, as well as members of Basingstoke Shed, the Basingstoke branch of Men’s Shed, a communal workshop experience for men.

A myriad of other items and objects that came in for repair, not just mechanical repairs either. Coats, clothing and electronic items were on the list of repaired items,

The board game nights at Basingstoke Makerspace have been going well, so we’re doing another one!

The concept is simple, turn up, bring a game if you would like, and we all sit down and have some fun. We can’t promise everyone’s game will be played, so be prepared to join in with another group. Also we suggest games around 1 hour in length, they normally take 1.5-2 hours once the rules have been explained anyway.

So whether you enjoy exploding kittens, want to start a pandemic or feel like going sub terra, come and join us for a night of gaming.

Finally, please bring whatever you would like to eat or drink for the evening. Those that are interested can also club together for a pizza order on the night.

From time to time, we all throw away things that have very little wrong with them and could easily be used again after a simple repair. If you have something broken but could be repaired, then bring it along to Basingstoke Makerspace on Sunday 23rd and we will do our best to help you repair it.

Get help to repair a range of items such as:

Push-bikes

Household goods

Electronics

Mechanical equipment

Computers (hardware/software)

Textiles/Furniture

Toys

Tool sharpening

The event is staffed entirely by volunteers and anyone can pop in! As well as repairs, tea/coffee and biscuits will be available. We appreciate any donations to help fund the next repair café.

Do you know what happens in a makerspace? Drop in to Basingstoke Makerspace on any Tuesday evening to find out.

At a recent Tuesday Open Evening. one individual was making a three-foot long dinosaur skeleton using a 3D printer. At the same time another was demonstrating how to use a wood lathe to create a wooden bowl. A group of people at one table discussed how artificial Intelligence could be used in the home, while others were busy creating jewellery at a nearby table. Some just enjoyed the free tea and coffee and watched as others tried out a pen that creates 3D.objects.

All in all, a fairly typical evening at the Makerspace!

You can find us every Tuesday at Maritime House, 65 New Rd, Basingstoke RG21 7PW on the opposite side of the road to Majestic Wine in Basingstoke.